Conventionally, exercise equipment in a recreation facility is intended for young people who are physically fit and who have muscular strength, and thus is not suited for use by elderly people or children. Therefore, a health-factor measuring device that enables all members of a family, including elderly users, to take moderate exercise, and that also provides them with entertainment so that they can enjoy exercising, has been proposed (see Patent Document 1 below). With this health-factor measuring device, the time that each member of a family takes in completing a certain set of exercises can be measured, and the family members can enjoy comparing the amount of time that each member takes to complete the exercises and seeing who is the fastest in the family. This device, however, does not measure the age of a user on the basis of the user's physical strength.
In measuring the age of a student on the basis of the student's physical strength (e.g., an elementary, junior high, or high school student), the student is required to do simple, repetitive exercises, the performance of which is measured as follows: Instantaneous force is measured by the distance that the student jumps by a standing broad jump; grip strength is measured by a grip dynamometer; agility is measured by the number of sideways jumps that the student can do within a specified time; flexibility is measured by how much the student can bend forward when sitting on a floor with his/her legs extended to the front; endurance is measured by the number of sit-ups that the student can do within a specified time; balance is measured by how long the student can stand on one foot with his/her eyes open; and so on. In these measurements to assess age on the basis of physical strength, a user is made to do simple, repetitive exercises. Therefore, when performing such exercises, (1) the user does not have much fun; (2) the user is not made to perform complex muscle actions; (3) the user is not made to use muscles that he/she does not usually use; and (4) although the user's basic physical abilities are measured, the user's complex physical abilities, including memory, attention, and other functions of the brain, are not measured. Accordingly, the user is made to do a long series of a variety of exercises, and the user's physical-strength age is assessed by how long he/she takes to complete the series, and by comparing that time with time data obtained in advance. However, with this method, using a long series of exercises, it is not possible to assess which athletic activities the user is good or bad at.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 2001-29503
Patent Document 2: Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 2004-278150